Hera, the latest version of Elementary OS, is an impressive platform for bringing outdated macBooks back to life.
When I installed Apple’s MacOS Mojave, it slowed my previously trusty MacBook Air to a crawl. My computer came out in 2015 with 4 GB of ram, an i5 processor, and a Broadcom 4360 wireless card, but Mojava was a bit too much for my daily use, and it didn’t work with GnuCash, which piqued my desire to return to Linux. I’m happy to be back, but I deeply regret that my wonderful MacBook is unused.
I tried several Linux distributions on the MacBook Air, but there were always flaws. Sometimes it’s a wireless card; In another case, it lacked support for a touchpad. After reading some good reviews, I decided to try Elementary OS 5.0 (Juno). I made a boot disk using USB and plugged it into my MacBook Air. I got to a live desktop and the operating system recognized my Broadcom wireless chipset — I thought it might work!
I liked what I saw in Elementary OS. The Pantheon desktop is really great, and it looks and feels familiar to Apple users — it has an docking dock at the bottom of the display and ICONS pointing to common apps. I was pleased with the preview I was expecting, so I decided to install it, and my wireless device disappeared. It’s really disappointing. I really like Elementary OS, but I can’t do it without wireless.
Fast forward to December 2019, and when I heard comments on the Linux4Everyone podcast about Elementary’s latest version v.5.1 (Hera) bringing MacBook back to life, I decided to try Hera again. I downloaded the ISO, created a bootable drive, plugged it into my computer, and this time the operating system recognized my wireless card. I can work on it now.
I’m glad my light and powerful MacBook Air has been refreshed with Linux. I’ve been studying Elementary OS in more detail, and I can tell you what IMPRESSED me.
Elementary OS features
According to Elementary’s blog, “The newly designed login and lock screen greetings look sharper, work better, and fix many of the issues reported in previous greetings, including input focus issues, HiDPI issues and better localization. Hera’s new design is in response to user feedback from Juno and enables some nice new features.”
“Nice new features” is an understatement — Elementary OS has one of the best-designed Linux user interfaces I’ve ever seen. By default, the System Settings icon on the system is located on the docking station. Changing the Settings was easy, and I soon had the system configured to my liking. I need the text size to be larger than the default and the accessibility is easy to use, allowing me to set large text and high contrast. I can also adjust the docking dock using larger ICONS and other options.
Pressing the Mac’s Command key brings up a list of keyboard shortcuts, which can be very helpful for new users.
Elementary OS comes with the Epiphany Web browser, which I find very easy to use. It’s a little different than Chrome, Chromium, or Firefox, but it’s more than enough.
For security-conscious users (and we should all be), Elementary OS’s security and privacy Settings offer several options, including a firewall, history, locking, automatic deletion of temporary and junk files, and a switch for location services on/off.
Learn more about Elementray OS
Elementary OS was originally released in 2011, and its latest version, Hera, was released on December 3, 2019. Elementary co-founder and CXO’s Cassidy James Blaede is the UX architect for the operating system. Cassidy loves using open technologies to design and build digital products that are useful, usable and enjoyable.
Elementary OS has excellent user documentation, and its code (licensed under GPL 3.0) is available on GitHub. Elementary OS encourages participation in the program, so be sure to lend a hand and join the community.
Via: opensource.com/article/20/…
Author: Don Watkins
This article is originally compiled by LCTT and released in Linux China